1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a knife, and more particularly to a pocketknife that has an assistant assembly that works alternatively to assist a user to open and close the blade of a pocketknife with less strenuous effort.
2. Description of Related Art
Foldable knives are generally used to cut or whittle articles and are compact so they can be safely carried in a person's pocket.
A conventional pocketknife has a handle, a blade and a spring. The handle has an inside edge, an outside edge, a front end, a rear end and a longitudinal slot. The longitudinal slot is formed in the inside edge. The blade is attached pivotally to the front end of the handle, folds into the longitudinal slot in the handle for storage or extends from the front end for use and has a proximal end. The proximal end is pivotally attached to the front end of the handle. The spring is a leaf type spring, is mounted in the outside edge of the handle and abuts the blade to keep the blade closed when the blade is folded into the handle and to keep the blade open when the blade extends from the front of the handle. However, wearing of the proximal end of the blade and weakening of the spring may allow the blade to open when subjected to an inadvertent external impact, and the exposed blade may injure the person carrying the knife.
Furthermore, the inventor's previous invention of U.S. Pat. No. 7,249,417 discloses another pocketknife that allows the blade to pivot laterally out through one side surface thereof and has a lock mechanism to lock the blade in a folded or extending position. However, a user has to manually push the blade out all the way when extending out the blade due to lack of an assistant unfolding mechanism, which is laborious and disadvantages the use of the pocketknife.
To overcome the shortcomings, the present invention provides a pocketknife with an assistant assembly to mitigate or obviate the aforementioned problems.